


Inked

by overratedantihero



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Deathstroke the Terminator (Comics), Nightwing - Fandom, Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics)
Genre: Bets, Brotherly Goading, Jumping Rooftops, M/M, Mild Stabbing, Tarantino Movies, Tattoos, The Slade/Dick is incredibly understated, tattoo shop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 15:18:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16065848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/overratedantihero/pseuds/overratedantihero
Summary: Dick and Jason make a bet. Dick loses.





	Inked

“Oh shit, Dick!” Jason leapt to his feet. Dick couldn’t see the grin plastered to his face, not from behind his helmet, but he knew what it looked like. “Dick, you’re _scared_.”

“ _Nightwing_ , Red Hood. Masks are on. And I’m not scared, it’s not like that.” Dick didn’t move from where he sat on the edge of the building, legs dangling, leaning forward to keep the rough winds which announced a stirring tropical storm off the coast from pushing him back. All the bats were out, sweeping the city as the chaotic masses of disaster preppers picked apart grocery stores and gas stations. It was rare that Gotham got a storm, and although the tropical storm wasn’t quite a hurricane yet, meteorologists buzzed about the potential.  

Jason settled back down next to Dick. “Then what’s stopping you, N? You want one, this next weekend is perfect. There’s a storm, not bad enough for your modus operandi, but wet enough that jumping rooftops won’t be practical. Is it B?”

Dick frowned. “I don’t have a standard of _badness_ that an incident has to meet before I intervene. I see something, I do something. I’ve plucked cats out of trees.”

Jason sighed, a long, drawn out, unamused sigh. “You’re deliberately diverting the conversation. It’s B, isn’t it? You don’t think he’d approve, so like the dutiful first son you are, you’re just not going to do anything about it. Or,” Jason tugged off his helmet so that Dick could receive the full force of his toothy grin, “you _are_ scared, and you’re just using B as an excuse.”

Dick pursed his lips and stood. The wind had him swaying, the toes of his boots hovered over thin air even though his heels were still planted on the concrete. “Let’s make a deal. You catch me, and I’ll do it. I’ll even get what you pick for me.”

Jason’s eyes widened from behind the lenses.

“And if I don’t catch you?” Jason asked, pushing himself to his feet too.

“Then you can’t mention your death for a week,” Dick grinned.

Jason flashed his teeth. “This shit’s permanent, N, it ain’t magic marker. You sure you want me to pick your first tattoo?”

Dick beamed and then threw himself off the roof. Jason popped his helmet on and followed.

Half an hour later, give or take a couple of minutes, Dick scowled at Jason from where he lay on top of storage container while Jason loomed over him.

“You cheated,” Dick spat, removing his hand from his calf to grimace at the blood.

“Didn’t. You told me to catch you, you didn’t say I couldn’t throw knives at you. Ready for your ink, Big Bird?”

Dick grumbled something unintelligible as he stood, leaning on Jason for support so that he wouldn’t have to put too much pressure on his injured leg before evaluating the breadth of the damage.

“Chin up,” Jason chirped. “When it’s your first, they let you ring a bell afterwards and the whole shop cheers. I’ll even get one with ya. Robin solidarity.”

“You stabbed me,” Dick hissed.

“And if you can take that, you can take a few needles. Do you want to change first?”

Dick nodded. “Red Hood, can I see your face for a moment?”

Jason was still. “Why?” he murmured, distrustfully. Dick pointedly cupped his calf again.

“I just. I need to tell you something, and I want to be able to tell it to your face. You… you were kind of right. Earlier.”

Jason scrambled to remove the helmet. “Oh?” he asked, already grinning, tucking his helmet under his arm.

“No,” Dick snapped, right before wiping his bloodied glove all over Jason’s face while Jason spluttered and tried to push him off.

“You are such a dick,” Jason grumbled.

“Masks are on!” 

* * *

 

In retrospect, Dick couldn’t remember what he was ever nervous about. Jason followed him home to change (Dick didn’t need to get this tattoo as Nightwing, only to have it recognized the next time Dick Grayson wore swim trunks or posed for a magazine) and then guided him to the shop. Jason must have called ahead because the artists were already expecting them, and they were jovial and professional. Even if they kept glancing between Jason and Dick as if it were the first time Dick Grayson, heir to the Wayne fortune, had ever been caught around any of Gotham’s notable vigilantes (okay, so usually he was being held hostage by them, but _still_.)

And when Jason told the artist what to draft, Dick let out a breath he didn’t even realize he was holding.

“You know Bludhaven’s blue guy? Nightwing? Grayson here’s a fan. He wants Nightwing’s emblem. Tell the nice man where you want it, Dick.”

Dick hadn’t expected to get to customize Jason’s choice, but he did, and the enthusiasm in which he took to planning out this tattoo had Jason wincing.

“Dick, this is your first tattoo, you may want to take it easy,” Jason warned when Dick and the artist showed Jason the sketch. Jason was already settled backwards into a seat while an artist drug the humming cluster of needles over his skin. The sound unnerved Dick, but he had made his choice and now that he was here, he wouldn’t be deterred.

“Yeah,” Dick said. “I’m sure.”

“We usually don’t do tattoos this big for someone’s first time, but…” the artist glanced back at Jason. Jason’s artist pulled the machine back to dip the needles into the little pots of ink by his side, and Jason took the opportunity to shrug. Dick’s artist returned his attention to Dick and said, “If you think you can handle it, I’ll get it done. Just tell me if it gets to be too much. Red said he wanted this done in one session, but we’ll break it into a few if you need.”

Dick beamed.

The next night, the storm never hit quite like Gotham’s meteorologists thought it would. But there was no way Dick could fit the skin-tight Nightwing uniform over his sore, inflamed tattoo, and so he called into Bruce, faked a rasp, and then buried his face into the couch cushion and groaned.

“This is your fault,” he muttered into the couch.

Jason hit ‘play’ on the movie they’d been watching before Dick called Bruce. “I can’t control the weather, Dickie, I’m not a god,” Jason said from where he perched in a recliner. “And if I were—”

“You’d be a god of death, I get it, Jay,” Dick muttered, turning his face to watch the screen. Jason scowled and threw a popcorn kernel at Dick. “And you know exactly what I’m talking about,” Dick added. “The tattoo,” he supplied, just in case Jason didn’t know exactly what he was talking about.

“No, I was going to say, I’d just wipe Gotham off the map and call it a day. And the tattoo idea was mine, but goddamn, Dick, you ran with it. I thought you’d get something small, like, on your ankle. But no, you went full tramp stamp, and then you did the thing in one session. Don't put that on me.”

“Does it count as a tramp stamp,” Dick said, wincing as shifted to reach into the bag of candy he had on the coffee table, “if it’s most of my lower back? I thought tramp stamps were just right above your ass.”

“They are,” Jason said, eyes trained on the screen as a fight scene began. “And so’s yours. You got a massive tramp stamp, get over it.”

Dick grumbled but fell into silence as the movie played out. Not long after the credit scenes began rolling, Dick got an alert on his phone around the same time he heard a window scraping open.

Jason was already on the ground in front of the entertainment center, sifting through Dick’s discs. “Should I be worried?” Jason asked without looking up.

Dick checked his phone. When he’d first gotten the apartment, he’d just alarmed the windows. After one too many bats set off the alarms, he installed a key pad. Of the people who had codes, no two people had the same code, and Dick received an alert on his phone whenever a key was used.

“Nah,” Dick tossed his phone onto the carpet and threw a piece of candy at Jason’s head. “Pick a Tarantino next.”

Jason was about to report, but heavy footsteps interrupted, and he glanced over his shoulder. He scowled.

“Really, Dick? Deathstroke the Terminator has a fucking key to your window? It took months before you gave me one.” There was a movement like wet cloth over skin, Dick could envision Slade tugging away his mask. The muted drips of water on his floor that followed confirmed it.

Dick shrugged and sat up on his knees, wincing at how the movement pulled the skin on his back. “What do you need, Slade?” Dick asked, sounding gruffer than he intended. He was _sore_.

Slade blinked at him. Then, he glanced over at Jason. “I didn’t hear you over the comms link,” Slade murmured slowly as he looked back at Dick. “I became concerned.”

Jason snorted. “If you came over for a quick fuck, you’re out of luck,” he said, putting away the discs. “Dick’s being a whiny bitch right now.”

“I am not!” Dick whined. “Jason made me get a tattoo!” he immediately tattled.

Slade cocked his head.

“Get off it, Dick. I wouldn’t have made you get one if you’d fought me on it. And you’re the one who decided it should be bigger than your ego.” Jason popped in a disc and returned to his popcorn and chair.

“Slade, you’re dripping water everywhere. Go change or something,” Dick grumbled. Slade raised his eyebrows. “Please?” Dick added, suddenly catching his own tone.

Slade grunted and left the room.

“Remember that time you said you didn’t want a tattoo because B wouldn’t approve,” Jason said, not looking away from the screen.

“Shut up, Jay,” Dick muttered. “I didn’t say that, you said that and then decided I said that.” Dick looked up at the ceiling, “And I was nervous because I thought it’d hurt.”

“Oh?” Jason cooed, a shadow of a grin on his face. “Knew you were scared.”

“Yeah, well. Then you stabbed me with a knife,” Dick tugged up his sweatpants and gestured to his bandaged leg, “and that settled that.”

“Glad I could help you face your fears,” Jason offered. “You can thank me, your brave little brother, later.”

Dick was about to snap a retort, but then Slade returned in a pair of sweats and a pale t-shirt, both leftover from when he last came around. He sat down on the couch next to Dick, and Dick stretched out into Slade’s lap happily.

There was a moment of silence as the three watched the movie. Slade let gaze shift. He’d seen the raised, inked quote on Jason’s back when he’d walked in, but he hadn’t gotten a good look at Dick’s… 

“Christ, kid.”

**Author's Note:**

> Jason tattoo says "Dying / Is an art, like everything else" by Sylvia Plath, "Lady Lazarus"


End file.
